The caged misery of Britain’s real ‘Hannibal the Cannibal’

Multiple killer Robert Maudsley has spent more than 20 years in solitary. His supporters say this only repeats the abuse that led to his crimes

‘It does not matter to them whether I am mad or bad. They do not know the answer and they do not care just so long as I am kept out of sight and out of mind’.Robert Maudsley.

They called him ‘Blue’ because that was the colour the face of his first victim had turned as he slowly strangled him. Then he became known as ‘Spoons’ after killing again and leaving the body with a spoon sticking out of the skull and part of the brain missing.

His third and fourth victims died on the same afternoon and soon afterwards Robert Maudsley acquired the nickname that has stuck: Hannibal the Cannibal.

Although he is now nearly 50 and has not committed a crime for more than 25 years, Maudsley is officially classified as Britain’s most dangerous prisoner, a man said to represent such a high risk to those around him that he has spent the past quarter of a century in virtual isolation. With no prospect of ever being released, he will remain in prison in isolation until he dies.